The Empty World | The Empty World Sequence [complete | rewriting]

Thirteen

Joy sat up and slipped on her shirt.

Morpheus gazed down at Julien. He'd seen him asleep before of course, seen him every way there was to see. He touched Julien's shoulder lightly. Julien woke, and Joy's hand slipped across his back as he rose. He looked up at Morpheus, and Morpheus smiled. Julien sat, glaring at Morpheus with suspicion. He touched his chest then looked to the floor. Morpheus saw the shirt there and picked it up. "It's quite wrinkled and dirty," he said.

Julien sat back a little, looked at Morpheus, but spoke as if to Joy, "He looks at me funny," he said then pressed his lips together tightly. Morpheus was quite familiar with this sort of talk, just a little more hurtful and he might even call it shady.

"He likes you," said Joy. But neither Morpheus nor Julien believed when she said like she meant anything by it other than to say Morpheus had only been trying to be friendly.

"I'll go without the shirt," Julien said.

"People are going to come in," Morpheus said, "You wouldn't want us to think you the sort that shows off?"

"I'll put on a demur face," said Julien, "Besides, I know it's Shade they all want to look at."

Morpheus shrugged. He looked at Shade. He was sitting on the bed combing his fingers up through his hair. He'd rolled the sleeves of his bright blue suit jacket and let the cuffs of his shirt hang out loose, the shirt tails were untucked, the buttons mostly undone, the ankh hung at his ribs. He took his fingers from his hair and rolled the cuffs of his pants to show his sandals. He looked directly at Joy. "Is my face all...?" he asked.

Joy darted to her coffin and took something small from it. She threw it across the room to Shade. It was an eyeliner pencil, Shade lined the outside of both lids without a mirror, Morpheus supposed he'd been doing it so long he could do it perfectly without, and Shade could. The eyes were even more striking then.

Joy sat back down behind Julien. "You look yourself," she sighed, "Just like I remember."

Shade smiled. "I would kill someone for a black velvet jacket."

Julien laughed.

"He'd kill someone anyway," said Joy.

"Morpheus," said Shade, "You can let them in. I'm ready for them." He pulled his legs up and sat cross-legged on the bed.

Morpheus opened the door.

Mother and Mazaret came in first. Others came then, Crystal, Alexi, Gregory, Sarah, two matriarchs of the Wolfbreed, and Spider and Maya. Mazaret and Joy took turns telling the story of how they had been captured, the actions of Blade, how they had come to New Orleans, and how they had built this underground haven. Shade listened, as others studied him.

Shade said that he had not known any of this was going on. Of course others doubted, and so he explained. He had quarreled with Angel, he called Blade by this taken name, and he had left her in London and Shade supposed Angel had gone to New York. He'd spent years living in the loft of a barn out in the country and had never known of the trouble their kind were having with humans. He'd noticed a certain silence in the world, but he hadn't known why till Julien came looking for him, and explained.

As for Julien, he'd left Athen in a villa in Karachi, a villa that Julien owned. When Joy asked him why Julien said, "Psyche showed up, I woke up and she was in bed with us, tied there. But, Shade and I like to say, I was meant to come find him and come here, so I did." Of course anyone else who might have heard didn't take much notice of this, this bedroom intrigue didn't interest them, they only wanted to know what could be done about the Humans.